


Bloodletting

by damnslippyplanet



Series: Bloodletting [1]
Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: And TBH Will's such an emotional disaster none of it's very sexy at all, Fighty sex, M/M, These boys are very confused, prompted fic, sexy fighting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-28
Updated: 2016-02-28
Packaged: 2018-05-23 17:57:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6125189
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/damnslippyplanet/pseuds/damnslippyplanet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hannibal calls this “physical therapy.” Will calls it “sparring” out loud, but in the back of his mind he knows it’s something more like actual therapy; a safe place to work out unspeakable things. Although it also wouldn’t be incorrect to call it foreplay.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bloodletting

**Author's Note:**

> My prompting anon wanted a sparring session to become sexy fun times, but what came out is more like Post-Finale Will Graham Is Kind Of Fucked In The Head About The Difference Between Sex and Violence. Sorry, anon. Hope you like it anyway. If it helps any, I'm pretty sure that somewhere after this, in a follow-on that I may or may not write, Will works his shit out and both the sparring and the sex get more fun.

Will narrows his eyes at Hannibal, trying to ignore how they burn from the sweat trickling down his forehead. He’s trying to keep moving, circling, looking for an opening, but he’s tiring fast. And he’s pretty sure Hannibal knows it, if that tiny irritating hint of amusement at the corners of his mouth is anything to go by.

The first several times they did this, Hannibal’s gunshot wound was still slowing him down enough that Will kept up handily and got in plenty of satisfying hits of his own, pinning Hannibal more than once. But as the days go by and Hannibal gets stronger and more able to take advantage of his size and alarming speed, Will’s losing ground. He’s having to resort to dirtier tricks - fewer half-remembered moves from police force training, more survival tactics from fights of his childhood.

Will darts forward and tries to sweep Hannibal’s leg out from under him; he doesn’t quite make it but does manage to at least shove the man off-balance. Hannibal staggers and Will grins fiercely, taking the moment to go ahead and swipe the sweat off his forehead before stepping back out of range. He manages to find enough breath for a quick huff of laughter and a snarled, “Almost got you that time.”

He still remembers some of those schoolyard fights; the taunts had stung worse and for longer than any of the actual scratches or bruises. He remembers learning, painfully, to give as good as he got. To kick and bite and not care if hair-pulling was a “girl” maneuver, if it caught his opponent off-guard and let him get in another punch.

These days it’s a little more complicated, in that his opponent really likes the biting and hair-pulling, and doesn’t like the kicking so much but does have a tendency to mutter a pleased-sounding “ _Good_ , Will” as soon as his breath comes back. Usually followed by getting a chokehold on Will’s neck or a swift hard strike to his side. God only knows if he gets the hits in because Will’s not good enough, or because the warmth of his praise shreds Will’s defenses.

Goddamn fucking praise in the middle of a goddamn fucking fight. Nothing’s clean and simple the way Will wants it to be. He’d like the new, fragile intimacy between them to stay in the bedroom where it belongs, and for these fights on the back lawn to be just that - fights, damn it, fights where you bruise and bleed and do not praise your attacker or make that particular timbre of sound when flat on your back.

Hannibal calls this “physical therapy.” Will calls it “sparring” out loud, but in the back of his mind he knows it’s something more like actual therapy; a safe place to work out unspeakable things. Although it also wouldn’t be incorrect to call it foreplay.

Hannibal’s regained his balance now and he’s watching Will steadily, moving ever so slightly back and forth so Will can’t quite get a fix on where he’ll be at any given moment. He reminds Will of nothing so much as a snake; coiled power just deciding whether or when it’s worth the energy it takes to strike.

He is beautiful when he moves; he is beautiful at rest. Will sometimes wants to lock Hannibal up where no one else can ever see that beauty again but him. Worse than the desire is the fact that he’s fairly certain Hannibal would let him, as long as Will locked himself in too. They could shut the world out and spend the rest of their days doing nothing but hurting and healing each other, taking it in turns.

It’s a more appealing idea than it should be.

He’d like to understand how to untangle the mess of tenderness and violence that bind the two of them together. Here in the yard when Hannibal pins him and unexpectedly mouths sweetness against his skin before deftly hurting him just enough to make Will go limp and give up the victory; in their bed when Will draws blood and does not always care whether the shuddering beneath his hands is pleasure or pain. When Hannibal likes Will not caring, when he shatters from it and the shattering pierces Will’s heart enough to make him remember that he cares after all, deeply, about putting Hannibal back together again. So that they can come out here the next day and Hannibal can grind Will into the dirt and wring him out utterly and then praise him for losing.

Will would like something about this new life, any one bit of it, to make sense.

It doesn’t make sense that when Hannibal finally uncoils and springs, when Will’s attempt to sidestep away is only half-successful, when Hannibal gets hold of Will’s wrist and twists it up behind him, high and hard where it hurts like hell, Will doesn’t actually want to pull away. It’s hard to admit that when he throws his head back he’s not sure if he’s trying to butt Hannibal’s jaw with his skull, or hoping Hannibal will bite the exposed skin at the juncture of Will’s neck and shoulder.

They’ve practiced this. He knows what to do. He should lean forward and try to unbalance Hannibal, pull up his knee and kick backwards and try to take out a leg or kick Hannibal in the groin. He knows how. He just...can’t. He’s exhausted himself and his need to do harm.

All the fight goes out of Will in a rush and he’s abruptly just _done_. He lets himself buckle. As surely as he knew Hannibal would have held his wrist hard and painful as long as it took to keep him in place, he knows Hannibal will catch him now. Which he does. Because that’s part of the tangle, too: Hannibal’s hands that flip like a lightswitch from hurting Will to gentling him when he shudders and falls. Hannibal’s hands that pull sensations from Will that he didn’t know he could feel.

He tries halfheartedly to protest when Hannibal tells him, “Enough for today.” But they both know it’s over. He lets Hannibal walk him into the house and into the master bathroom where they keep the medical kit. This part is becoming routine now too, and just as confusing as the rest of it.

He doesn’t know how to reconcile the gentle touch and hungry eyes of Hannibal peeling off his shirt with the clinical attention he then gives to Will’s mostly-healed wounds. He understands when Hannibal prods gently at a new and rapidly-purpling area on Will’s ribs to see if there’s any real harm there, every inch the concerned doctor, but not when he presses lips to the bruise afterward in a purely self-indulgent kiss. Will can’t contain his own reaction, the wince at the pressure on his tender skin mingled with the ripple of heat that spikes through his body at the touch. He probably could contain his voice but he doesn’t want to. What he wants is to see the heat flare in Hannibal’s eyes when Will says, “I’ll live. Take me to bed.”

They don’t always go to bed after the fighting. Sometimes Will hasn’t worked enough adrenaline out of system and, afraid of what he might do or unable to stand being touched, he goes for a run instead or shuts himself away in his workroom. Sometimes one of them really does hurt the other and the aftermath becomes bandages and painkillers and apologies. Sometimes they fight to a cheerful uncomplicated draw and end up sprawled comfortably in the grass comparing notes and tactics, watching the sun slip through the sky.

But more often than not it’s this. They do their best to tear each other apart until one of them breaks. And then they come back together, already half-exhausted and sweaty and aching before they even get to the bedroom, where they lie filthy with grass and dirt and the occasional smear of blood in Hannibal’s insanely-high-thread-count sheets. They gather up each other’s broken pieces and jagged edges and fit them back into place, marking each one with a kiss or a touch. They make something together that isn’t anger or fear, but also isn’t the slow worshipful love Hannibal makes to Will in the mornings, so what is it?

Maybe if Will knew the answer to that, he wouldn’t need it so much. It’s no wonder he’s a little confused about all of this, he supposes.

But it’s hard to follow that train of thought anywhere useful with Hannibal’s mouth at his collarbone, with busy hands pushing the remaining bits of clothing off and away. There’s a slow but steady tide of desire rising under his skin and he tries to open to it, wills it to take him fast and hard and so strong that there’s no room for any of the other more confusing thoughts in his head. Before it can wash him away completely, Will slides his arms around Hannibal and, ignoring the protest in his ribcage where that bruise is spreading darker by the minute, he manages to find the energy for the one last twist and heave he didn’t have in him outside. He pushes and rolls and Hannibal goes, over onto his back, with Will astride him and feeling just that little bit in charge again that he needs.

Will thinks _I win_ but doesn’t say it. They have so many games going at one time. He’s winning this one and losing the one outside where they fight, and he’s forgotten what some of the others even are. Fuck it. At this exact moment he doesn’t care. He presses fingernails lightly into the skin of Hannibal’s upper chest, where he could rake them down and leave long bloody streaks, or slide them gently in a caress. Hannibal arches up into his hands, making the press of his nails worse than it would be, and says only, "Oh, _please_ , Will." He doesn't specify what he wants, which makes sense because all he ever wants is Will, any way Will wants to take or be taken. Will balances for a moment on the point where he might hurt, or not.

Eventually he slides his fingertips upward, teasing along the lines of Hannibal’s throat and jaw and framing his face. He leans forward, neither courting nor avoiding the added sweet-hot pressure it causes where their hips grind together, and whispers, “God, I love you,” into Hannibal’s mouth just before he kisses away any possible response Hannibal might make. He doesn’t want to hear the words; he wants to feel them instead, in Hannibal’s hands and mouth and every inch of skin they can find to press together.

Someday maybe he’ll be able to say it some other way, some easier way than Hannibal beating him half-senseless before he can make the words form. Someday he’ll be able to hear it some other way than after all of this, after both the fighting and the fucking, when every ounce of resistance has escaped him so that he can finally lie still and soft and sweet for Hannibal to whisper, “I love you too” without trying to fight it.

Someday this will make sense, he’s sure, if he can just hang on that long. For now there’s this. His aching muscles from old wounds and new bruises, and Hannibal alive and wanting underneath him, and the rising tide of Will’s own needs.

He bends to Hannibal again and drinks from his mouth all the things he won’t let Hannibal tell him any other way, and he lets the tide sweep them both away.


End file.
